Garden goodies with a healthy dose of life's simple pleasures

Make a Festive Summer Bouquet

The best part about growing flowers in the garden is cutting blossoms for bouquets in the house. Whether you grow roses, sunflowers, lavender or mums, there are always ways to bring the beauty of your garden inside.

Since my dahlias have been growing like gangbusters, I’ve been clipping stems whenever I get a chance. I also have roses that were here when we moved in (that I nearly cut down), mums that are blooming even though it’s not fall and Minoan Lace that reseeded from last year and has taken over a corner of my front garden.

Here’s a bouquet I made recently with dahlias, roses, Minoan lace and lavender. I reused a glass apple juice container I had saved.

Here are some roses I clipped from a wild shrub outside of my office window.

This one includes a lily, dahlias, poppies, Minoan lace, broccoli flowers and sprigs from my lemon tree in a teapot with bicycles on it.

To make flowers last, I use this recipe, that I got from the book Petal & Twig, and adjust it to adapt to the size of the container: